The Association for Spiritual Integrity — honor code of ethics for spiritual teachers

[Carl-Richard]

4 minutes ago, Nilsi said:

That's not the point.

It's not "every man for himself." It's "truth is sacred and shouldn't be outlawed just because it hurts your feelings."

Is truth being outlawed if somebody tells me I probably shouldn't fuck my students? Stop being so dramatic lol. It's ethics, not law.

[Nilsi]

1 minute ago, Carl-Richard said:

Is truth being outlawed if somebody tells me I probably shouldn't fuck my students? Stop being so dramatic lol. It's ethics, not law.

This is a stupid comparison. 

The problem is that people are stupid and don't understand truth and thus are not in a position to tell sages and mystics how they should go about their work.

[Carl-Richard]

2 minutes ago, Nilsi said:

What is philosophy?

Actually, what is all of culture, if not this conversation?

In fact, what is society? Safety. You can decide to not participate, but don't pretend it's not dangerous.

[Nilsi]

4 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

In fact, what is society? Safety. You can decide to not participate, but don't pretend it's not dangerous.

Spirituality is not happening within society.

We can talk about creating a great society and I'm all for that, but that's not this conversation. We can even talk about religion.

Spirituality is fundamentally your business and every attempt to undermine this is literally evil.

Edited December 24, 2022 by Nilsi

[Someone here]

5 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

Tell me, in what other facet of life is seeking guidance looked upon with suspicion? Especially when it comes to something dangerous like spirituality, where you're deconstructing your sense of reality. It's quite ridiculous.

Dude..relax..I'm agreeing with you...all I'm saying is A spiritual teachers job is to give you a path, a practice and then you can go away and get on with it. So it is really looking at the path, the practice and the teachings that the spiritual teacher is generously giving you, and if you feel they are useful.

If they try to keep you with them, or keep you constantly coming back, and/ or they are taking from you, demanding of your constant attention or worship and obedience then you might just wonder if they are worth your time. If they are telling you not to think for yourself or imposing a belief system upon you, or belittling you in any way that is really an abuse of power. These kinds of abuses do seem to happen much more in the Guru tradition.

[Carl-Richard]

Just now, Nilsi said:

Spirituality is not happening within society.

We can talk about creating a great society and I'm all for that, but that's not this conversation.

Yes it is.

[Nilsi]

1 minute ago, Carl-Richard said:

Yes it is.

Why are we playing these games?

We can talk about religion and I'm interested in that conversation, but that's not spirituality.

[SeaMonster]

The problem with Ethics Boards, though, is that it smacks of a power structure which is misleading in its existence.

Namely, that "spirituality" is another consumer product to be treated as a consumer product.  This implies a whole set of presuppositions and expectations that do not apply in spirituality.  It also creates the possibility of capture by corrupt forces that will wield that power to their own ends.

In other words, make changes supposedly for the benefit of the seeker that aren't.

It's better to have a standalone code that teachers themselves voluntarily adopt -- or even competing codes -- without a centralized authority.

(Basically, all these ethics rules all sound nice - but a teacher can be entirely ethical and entirely ineffective.  So what do you do about that?)

Edited December 24, 2022 by SeaMonster

[zurew]

10 minutes ago, SeaMonster said:

(Basically, all these ethics rules all sound nice - but a teacher can be entirely ethical and entirely ineffective.  So what do you do about that?)

How any of those ethics rules make the teachings less effective or significantly less effective?

Edited December 24, 2022 by zurew

[SeaMonster]

2 minutes ago, zurew said:

How any of those ethics rules make the teachings less effective or significantly less effective?

Re-read what I said.  It's not that they make the teachings less effective, it's that they don't necessarily make them EFFECTIVE in the first place. 

So at best you have a teacher that does no harm, but no good either (and is doing no good its own form of harm?)

[zurew]

1 minute ago, SeaMonster said:

it's that they don't necessarily make them EFFECTIVE in the first place. 

So at best you have a teacher that does no harm, but no good either (and is doing no good its own form of harm?)

The effectiveness is irrelevant in the context of this conversation. The effectiveness is a separate conversation, right here we care about the ethics part.

[Razard86]

3 hours ago, roopepa said:

lol

You guys LOVE the teacher / student shit here. I bet you'd come up with a thousand and one rationalizations.

Keep on with your stories built on insecurity and bloated self-image. ? Just blatant manipulation and narcissism.

It's okay man, they still want to cling to the belief of right and wrong. Until one is ready to drop the belief of right and wrong they need rules and regulations to keep them feeling safe. While everything you said is on point, they cannot understand as long as they cling to right and wrong. 

[Carl-Richard]

26 minutes ago, SeaMonster said:

This implies a whole set of presuppositions and expectations that do not apply in spirituality.

Spirituality is not special. It doesn't need special treatment.

[Carl-Richard]

1 minute ago, Razard86 said:

It's okay man, they still want to cling to the belief of right and wrong. Until one is ready to drop the belief of right and wrong they need rules and regulations to keep them feeling safe. While everything you said is on point, they cannot understand as long as they cling to right and wrong. 

"To awaken, just must guzzle buckets of my cum. What — are you attached to the idea of right and wrong?"

[SeaMonster]

4 minutes ago, zurew said:

The effectiveness is irrelevant in the context of this conversation. The effectiveness is a separate conversation, right here we care about the ethics part.

I'm making it relevant because it's the reason why people seek teachers in the first place.  You can't ignore that issue as part of the conversation.

If a teacher is more effective than others, some people will not give a shit that he does not subscribe to some of the tenets of the code.  They ultimately want to get enlightened.  This whole thing really smacks of something like codes for psychotherapy, and psychotherapists can be notoriously ineffective (but they are still ethical!)

A teacher should be self-responsible and have their own clearly stated code, but a board is just absurd in my opinion.  I'm sure Jac O'Keefe is a fine teacher, but I don't think she has thought through all the implications here. 

[SeaMonster]

2 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

Spirituality is not special. It doesn't need special treatment.

That's where you are wrong -- you believe it's another consumer product.

Consumer products are about satiating the ego.  Spirituality isn't.

[zurew]

Just now, SeaMonster said:

I'm making it relevant because it's the reason why people seek teachers in the first place.  You can't ignore that issue as part of the conversation.

The reason why its irrelevant because following these rules won't necessarily make you less effective. So being ethical is not mutually exclusive to being effective.

1 minute ago, SeaMonster said:

If a teacher is more effective than others, some people will not give a shit that he does not subscribe to some of the tenets of the code. 

I don't think this is a problem. There is no good way for someone to measure which spiritual teacher is more effective than others, when you have almost no experience with the subject. There is no metrics by which you can judge which teacher is really effective ( at least  I don't really know any), people will go with a teacher that they can resonate with the most.

[Carl-Richard]

1 minute ago, SeaMonster said:

That's where you are wrong -- you believe it's another consumer product.

Consumer products are about satiating the ego.  Spirituality isn't.

Damaging the ego does not benefit spiritual growth. Transcending the ego does.

[Nilsi]

8 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

Spirituality is not special. It doesn't need special treatment.

Yes it is. We're talking about truth, while everything else are cultural constructions, which can be contained and modified for the benefit of society - which is what we should be talking about.

[SeaMonster]

3 minutes ago, zurew said:

I don't think this is a problem. There is no good way for someone to measure which spiritual teacher is more effective than others, when you have almost no experience with the subject. There is no metrics by which you can judge which teacher is really effective ( at least  I don't really know any), people will go with a teacher that they can resonate with the most.

That's not true.  Teachers can have reputations, testimonials, etc.  You may not know which teacher will be effective for you with certainty, but you may certainly make a better educated guess which teacher to try.

"Which teacher you resonate with" = whose sales pitch most appeals to your ego.